By Eric Johnson’s standards, the five-year gap between 2005’s Bloom and 2010’s Up Close is swift. It’s the shortest time between albums since Ah Via Musicom followed Tones by a mere four years and although Up Close could hardly be called spontaneous, it does have a looseness that’s often absent in Johnson’s work, perhaps because it trades so heavily on the guitarist’s Texas roots, a point he underscores by having songs called “Texas” and “Austin.”

Amplified is the 1999 debut solo album by Kamaal Fareed, better known as Q-Tip of A Tribe Called Quest. Born Jonathan Davis, this album features the hit songs "Vivrant Thing", "Breathe And Stop", "Let's Ride" and "Things U Do". The CD features a hidden track after track 12 called "Do It, See It, Be It" and it has been isolated as its own MP3.

It's been over a decade since Roy Montgomery's last album, and R M H Q is a hell of a return. This release contains four distinct records of new material. Listening to any of his work is a visceral experience repeating phrases swell and decay, immersing the listener in the cyclical narrative of his compositions. Montgomery was in his rock band period in the eighties, when the dark, minimalist post-punk of The Pin Group lead into the gloriously open-ended freedoms of Dadamah.

Love, Q features some of producer/composer/arranger/trumpeter and music legend Quincy Jones' best-known love songs. Spanning a nice swath of time from the '70s through the '90s, the collection focuses on Jones' R&B-oriented material. Included here are such stellar tunes as the steamy Leon Ware/Bruce Fisher number "Body Heat," Patti Austin's lyrical "Love Me By Name," and the Tevin Campbell feature "Everything." While this isn't the definitive Jones compilation, or even as complete a picture as Hip-O's previous Jones package, Ultimate Collection, it is still nice to have all these "quiet storm"-ready tracks in one place.